Call of Duty NEXT aired on Friday, August 21, and it did the job it exists to do: show Modern Warfare 4 running and get a beta into people's hands the same afternoon. The full game arrives on October 23, and this time the platform list is the headline. MW4 is coming to PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PC via Battle.net and Steam, and Nintendo's Switch 2. A mainline Call of Duty on a Nintendo console is the sort of thing that would have read as a joke a few years ago.
What's new in multiplayer
The change everyone will feel first is movement. Sledgehammer has added climbing on pipes, hanging off ledges, and aiming while you are suspended, which is a real shift for a series that mostly kept your feet on the ground. Whether it makes matches better or just faster to die in is exactly what a beta is for.
The rest is recognisably Call of Duty. Six-v-six on a fresh set of maps, the usual modes alongside two new ones (Inflation, built around cash-bounty eliminations, and Hijack, a Data Spike control mode), a 10v10 Gunfight variant with maps that reconfigure mid-match, and 24v24 Ground War. There is also an AI tool called Gunny that recommends loadouts for you. I will reserve judgement on being coached by an algorithm in my own shooter until I have seen what it does.
The beta, briefly
Weekend One is live now for anyone who pre-ordered, and runs through August 25 at 10am PT. Weekend Two is the open beta, no pre-order needed, from August 28 to September 1, and it adds a campaign mission called Entrenched and Warzone Resurgence on a new map, Zodiac.
Annualised shooters live or die on the small stuff, and a reveal trailer will not tell you how the netcode holds up or whether the new movement feels good after twenty matches. The beta will. If you have been off Call of Duty for a couple of years, this is a low-commitment way to find out whether the new one is worth your October.
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